What the hell?
Liam stared at the swarm of gray-scaled snakes carpeting the ground. Wherever he and Shizuku drifted, the raised snake heads rotated to track them.
Are animals also pulled into this dream world? Shizuku's voice sounded in his mind.
Look around. Do you see any sparrows nearby? Liam maintained the same wandering speed as the surrounding "zombie tide." These things shouldn't eat birds.
Also, in this state, can they even eat anything?
The "zombie tide" was crowded. Dense. Far more than the thirty-plus martial artists staying at the back mountain villa.
Meaning there are this many "shadows" here. Including people from the front mountain art exhibition.
Liam and Shizuku pretended to be part of the horde while quietly navigating through the crowd. When they passed Wing, Shizuku's eyes filled with confusion. She obviously couldn't recognize who the muscular dream-version was. Liam glanced down at Hart. Even in his dream, the kid was practicing punches. Steady. Focused.
Enhancers are simple to a fault.
That made Liam think about Netero. The old man was an Enhancer too, but he was devious as hell. How could someone that calculating be "innocent"?
Then again, in his youth, Netero had thrown ten thousand punches every day out of gratitude. That sincerity awakened his Nen and made him invincible. With that mindset and that experience, you couldn't deny his "purity." At least on the path to martial strength, he'd been extremely straightforward. So straightforward that even though he could've defeated the Ant King safely with team tactics, he'd chosen to challenge the King one-on-one instead. Testing his limits. Accepting death if necessary.
Liam suddenly stopped drifting. He backtracked slightly and looked at someone who'd just passed by.
The bunny girl!
The person you saw in the cave? Shizuku asked, looking curiously at Pyon, who wandered in a dream-like state.
Pyon's dream aesthetic was completely different from everyone else's.
Others had weird, fragmented dreams. But what floated around her body looked like web pages and pop-up windows opening and closing rapidly.
When it comes to internet addiction, she's number one.
Liam had known Pyon was at Sensui Mountain. But even a master like one of the Twelve Zodiacs being caught in this strange dream world? That was unexpected.
Liam and Shizuku drifted away, avoiding the gray-scaled snakes that receded like a tide.
Web pages and pop-up windows flashed rapidly around Pyon as she wandered forward unconsciously. Sometimes they transformed into lines of green code, scrolling around her translucent form.
The "zombie tide" continued drifting toward the peach tree ahead. Distance was deceptive. What looked close kept getting farther. Liam gradually realized the tree was terrifyingly massive. Forty or fifty meters tall. Covered in dreamlike peach blossoms that scattered on the wind, drifting toward the approaching horde.
Is there someone under the tree?
Liam and Shizuku's voices sounded in each other's minds simultaneously. They both stared intently at the giant tree with its lush peach blossoms.
A stone statue about one meter tall sat quietly beneath the branches.
The figure sat cross-legged. Its earlobes hung impossibly long, reaching down to its shoulders. A Buddha statue.
The stone Buddha had no kindness or compassion. No anger or joy. Like it had been sitting there since the beginning of the world and would remain until the end.
The Buddha's eyes were half-closed, gazing down at the chessboard in front of it quietly.
Liam and Shizuku looked at the motionless stone Buddha, then at the chessboard. There was no opponent.
Who is it playing chess with?
Everyone else was half-real and half-imaginary. But this stone Buddha felt solid. Real. Like the giant peach tree beside it. As if they were both intrinsic parts of this dream world.
Then the stone Buddha moved.
It turned its hand and picked up a white stone between its fingers. Click. The piece landed on the board.
As the sound of the falling stone spread outward, a powerful wind swept across the field, passing over all the dreamy figures who'd wandered close.
Liam heard a faint sound from somewhere far away.
He looked up. Countless peach blossom petals were swept into the night sky by a sudden gust. They spun rapidly, converging into a massive silhouette. Like an infinite Bodhisattva looking down on the world. It raised a palm formed from endless petals and brought it down toward the grassy plain.
The stone Buddha is Netero?
As the giant palm of petals descended, Liam looked at the statue beneath the tree. Cracks spread across its surface. The Buddha turned its head and looked directly at him. It smiled.
Then it collapsed.
BOOM.
The massive palm of peach petals crashed down, drowning everything.
The "Liam-as-Jaku" bird flew through the night sky and landed on a rooftop in the front mountain complex. It turned its head and rubbed the feathers on its neck.
Cold.
The bird twisted around, spread its wings, and dove down between the buildings. It flew through glass doors mid-flight, weaving through empty exhibition halls. Everywhere it passed, people were asleep. Dozing in chairs in corridors, heads against walls. Collapsed on sofas in hotel rooms.
Everyone's doing their best Sleeping Kogoro impression. At least they found comfortable spots before passing out.
Liam controlled the gray bird to fly out a window, hover for a moment, then head toward the back mountain.
This has to involve memory correction.
When these people wake up, they probably won't remember how or when they fell asleep. They'll just assume they dozed off for no reason.
The "Liam-as-Jaku" bird flew into the back mountain villa.
Is this a Manipulator's ability? If so, why did I get caught? If not, then what's the explanation for that dream world? Was it a collective illusion? Or an actual alternate space?
Space-based ability? But what about the forms Shizuku and I took in that dream? Those definitely weren't our real bodies.
And most importantly, where's the person who created this?
Or more directly: what the hell is the so-called Sky Master, who's supposedly from Netero's generation, actually doing?
One massive dream pulled everyone at the summit of Sensui Mountain into it. Liam couldn't think of anyone other than the Sky Master who could pull off something this impressive.
The "Liam-as-Jaku" bird flew while thinking. Suddenly it jerked its head up, flipped several times mid-flight to stop abruptly, and finally stabilized with frantic wing-flapping.
Wait.
Thanks to birds having eyes on the sides of their heads, when flying past the back mountain hotel just now, he'd caught a glimpse of something strange in one of the rooms.
The "Liam-as-Jaku" bird landed at that window and turned to look inside.
On the carpet, Hart lay on his side in a sprawl. His short arms and legs kicked occasionally. Probably dreaming of practicing some martial art.
But on the sofa, Wing's shirt was disheveled. And covering him was something outlined in black brush strokes. A black humanoid skeleton lying on top of Wing's body. The black skull facing the sleeping man's face.
Outside the window, the little gray bird's head turned. One eye reflected Wing's breath being sucked into the skull's eye sockets.
In the bird's other eye, the Bodhisattva made of petals in the night sky raised its palm and brought it down.
BOOM.
Endless peach petals flooded their vision. Liam and Shizuku suddenly jolted awake in the pavilion.
What was that black skeleton on Wing's body?
Was that stone Buddha actually Netero?
Not just the rabbit. But also the snake?
Is the so-called Sky Master a scheming old bastard?
Liam rubbed his temples. When the stone Buddha that seemed to be Netero was finally submerged by the giant palm of petals and collapsed, he thought he'd seen someone among the wandering figures. Someone who looked like one of the Twelve Zodiacs. The Snake. A sexy older woman.
She was just out for a walk and created all this inexplicable nonsense that makes my head hurt.
Where the hell is Kurapika when I need a strategist?
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